


'Til Our World is Gone

by gloss



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Healing, M/M, Reconciliation, Sad, great galactic bake-off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-02
Updated: 2017-10-02
Packaged: 2019-01-08 07:01:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12249339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloss/pseuds/gloss
Summary: They're both recovering from grievous injuries; Kes wants Poe to share his care package.





	'Til Our World is Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Orchis & GP as ever.
> 
> Title & epigraph from Morcheeba, "Over & Over"

> I'd like to meet a space man, who's got it going on  
>  Sailing through the stars at night 'til our world is gone

  


The _Narragonian_ is an ugly, awkward hulk of a thing. The ship used to be dedicated to long haul cargo; now it's a hospital and rehabilitation center. It was built for durability, not speed; as it lumbers after the Resistance, bleeding out on several fronts, across half the galaxy, it complains all the way. 

It shakes like a leaf, constantly. Like a whole damn tree, the Narragonian shivers and mutters to itself, gulps and gasps and plows on through the dark.

But it does move. Sometimes, especially these days, that is the very best you can hope for.

Finn is sitting in a narrow observation bubble, well to the rear of the ship, high on the hull. He just barely fits inside the space, and that's with one leg drawn up to his chest. He has his head tipped against the bulkhead and his other leg kicked out to the side.

Normally, he would be reviewing data - of troop deployments, or incoming codes, or rationing decrees. Normally, he would be keeping busy, because, normally, if Finn isn't busy, he's asleep.

Normally, then, he'd be learning and absorbing, synthesizing new information with old, adjusting and elaborating what he knew a moment ago into what he knows now.

But he isn't busy, and he certainly can't sleep. He's loath to close his eyes any time soon. Not out of fear of what he _might_ see, but due to conviction of what he will undoubtedly see. He learned early not to fear the unknown when the known provides more than plenty.

Several strides back, Poe loiters in the main passage. He's watching Finn watching the blank darkness beyond. He was about to say something. Before, he'd vault over the bench seat, land loud and unmistakable in Finn's lap, provide precisely that kind of boisterous distraction at which he excels (and always has).

 _Hey, buddy, credit for your thoughts? No, let me guess, that big squishy beautiful brain's pondering, what? Getting lucky? Because I know I'd like to help with that..._ and so on.

The banter has dried, gone sour, at the back of Poe's throat. His shoulder hurts too much to actually vault over, he doesn't actually _believe_ any of the bullshit that comes so easily to his lips, not at the moment, and, more than anything else, he doesn't want to bother Finn.

The line between distracting and bothering is thinner than just about anything, except the one between wishing and hoping.

He _wishes_ Finn would turn around. He _hopes_ it's okay that he's just standing here like a dolt.

Neither one gets anything done, however. They just keep him immobilized here, a little out of breath from hiking the passages. Wishes and hopes merely serve to remind him that he isn't where he wants, where he _needs_ , to be.

So he grasps the handrail that runs waist-high along the bulkhead, takes a breath, and hauls himself forward.

"Hey," Finn says when Poe's made it about halfway there. He can't sneak up on _anyone_ , not any more. His pranking days are done. "There you are."

"Here I come," Poe replies.

"Need a hand?"

"Nah. Got a spare arm, maybe?"

Finn doesn't say anything, but he does sit up a little straighter to make room for Poe.

It takes some maneuvering to get seated. Poe never realized just how heavy and clumsy a body is, all limbs that flop and skin that tears. Now, that knowledge has him permanently trapped. 

"Good?" Finn asks when Poe is -- not settled, certainly not _comfortable_ , but not moving quite so much, either.

"Sure," Poe says, smiling a little, tightly. "Let's go with that."

Finn doesn't smile back, though he catches the flicker of Poe's expression from the corner of his eye. He frowns, gaze still fixed on the scratched-up, well-patched observation window. He does, however, nod.

They're so careful with each other these days. Their injuries returned them to their bodies, forced them into skin and shattered bone. Their bodies, the sheer weight and awkward volume of _being_ in the world, will never again be disregarded. Just as they have to think through how to sit and where to look, they are aware, all over again and irrevocably, of the other person. How easily he hurts, how quickly he can be betrayed.

"Didn't think..." Poe starts to say but trails off.

Finn moves slightly, tucking himself more snugly against the bulkhead, and lifts his arm. "Here," he says, hand in the air between them, beckoning Poe closer.

Poe bites the inside of his cheek for a long moment. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Finn says. "It's pretty cramped here."

"Oh, so it's just efficient, huh?" Poe has to lift himself out of the seat and shuffle deliberately to close the gap.

"Yeah, you know me," Finn says, waiting until Poe is settled before carefully dropping his arm along the back of the bench. "Maximum efficiency."

"Of course," Poe murmurs. He can sense Finn's arm back there, but it's not touching him, let alone holding him. There's something moving in his thoughts, a joke or semi-ironic observation he could make about _so near, so far_ , but it refuses to clarify, to resolve into words. "Wouldn't have you any other way."

Finn gulps on a startled laugh. "Now, that's just a flat-out _lie_ , Poe Dameron."

"Yeah, maybe," Poe says reluctantly. He adds, more firmly, "I thought I meant it, though."

"Did you?"

Finn turns to look at him then, really _study_ Poe's expression. His attention should be agonizing. Before, it would have been delightful, having Finn look at him like this, taking his time, but now, it should be unbearable. Poe, however, has grown very accustomed to others -- doctors, medics, droids, First-Order interrogators -- studying him for as long as they damn well please. He can take it.

Compared to them, any look from Finn, however odd and distant, is wonderful.

"I did," Poe replies finally.

Finn's replacement eye glints and whirrs. The legs by which it attaches to his nervous system are splayed around the socket, hugging it close.

"You did, you really did, didn't you?" Finn says.

"I tend to say what I believe," Poe adds after a swallow. It's stupid and mean and petty, but these days, he doesn't have quite the energy he used to have for trying to be kind and generous. "Personal failing."

But Finn doesn't get mad this time. He presses his lips together in an expression like a frown, but he nods, too, and his arm slips down to lie across Poe's shoulders. His hand cups the far side of Poe's neck, gently. His palm is warm.

"What brings you out wandering the passages at this hell hour, anyway?" Finn asks.

Poe wonders if they're thinking about the same thing. His own thoughts are pretty simple (as usual): he's remembering the taste of Finn's mouth. At the same time, he is trying not to anticipate whether or not he'll ever get a chance to revisit it. 

He isn't doing so well on that second task.

"Sleep's not..." He shrugs his bad shoulder, then has to wince. Finn frowns sympathetically and squeezes the curve of muscle along Poe's neck. "Sleep's not too great lately. You?"

"Same boat," Finn says, then snickers for a second. "Or ship."

Poe taps the pocket on the front of his jacket. "Also, I have something for you."

Finn's quiet for a moment. Before he can say anything, however, Poe holds up his palm. "Don't get mad."

"I'm not mad, Poe." Finn's voice is soft and quiet and maybe a little sad. But that could be projection on Poe's part, or a blocked nasal passage on Finn's, or anything, really, other than _sad_. Finn himself doesn't feel much more than quiet and abstracted, more a placeholder sketch than a person.

"You seem mad," Poe says, but then adds quickly, "never mind, your feelings are your own, nothing for me to manage, I got it. I just wanted to share these with you."

"Share what?"

Poe takes out the package, about as big as his hand, wrapped in well-creased plastiflex. "Kes said they're for you."

Finn gives him half a smile. "So it's on Kes, huh?"

"That I'm bugging you? Yeah."

"You're not bugging me."

"Okay," Poe says carefully. He knows it's a stupid gimmick, and manipulative, too, how he is all but putting words in Finn's mouth to validate or deny. He just needs to get some sense of what Finn's thinking and feeling. But he doesn't know what else to do. It's not as if he can just ask.

Finn unwraps the packet and leans over to get a better look at the contents.

"Spiceroot biscuits," Poe says, probably unnecessarily. "He said you said you'd never had them and apparently that was something he had to fix, right away--"

"I remember," Finn says and takes a deep sniff of the biscuits. "They smell good."

"But then he had to wait for fresh spiceroot to come into season," Poe continues, "because, I don't know. He had this whole rant about degraded flavors in the ground version. Ground as in grinded down, not from the ground, that's where--"

"The fresh stuff is from the ground," Finn finishes for him and Poe nods rapidly.

"Yeah, that." Poe twists in the seat, which jars his bad side and makes him hiss a little. He breathes out through the pain, continuing only when the sting clears his eyes, "so that's why it took him so long to get them to you, sorry about that."

"You don't have to apologize." Finn turns the stack of biscuits over. Each one is roughly square, with crimped edges and Finn's first initial pressed into the center. 

"He told me to," Poe says. "Also, I _am_ sorry, this is really awkward."

"It's all right," Finn replies. It is awkward, but awkwardness never hurt anyone, not for very long.

Kes had promised to take him spiceroot hunting. After the war, whenever Finn wanted, Kes said he was at Finn's disposal. He'd described the damp earth, morning fog burning off halfway up the forest canopy, how careful you had to be. Only take the mature rhizome buds, leave the majority buried and untouched, make sure there'd be enough for next season, and the one after that.

 _Poe doesn't have the patience,_ Kes had said, which Finn didn't necessarily agree with. Poe has his own sort of patience, hard to describe, but certainly strong. At the very least, stubborn. _You need focus and calm to find them, even more to know how much to take, what to leave._

Finn breaks a biscuit in half and offers a piece to Poe. "Here, have some."

"I'm set, he sent other stuff--"

Finn chews and speaks at the same time. The biscuit is delicious, dense and spicy-hot and sweet. "Yeah? Like what?"

Closing his eyes so he can visualize the package contents, Poe says, slowly, "some goldfruit jerky, a couple flash-dried koyo slices, custard-berry pie. New underclothes."

"Damn," Finn says. "Good haul."

"Yeah, he's a good dude." Poe opens his eyes to find Finn looking directly at him again. His good eye is as bright and kind as it ever was; his new one is intent, inescapable. Poe's elbow is resting on Finn's waist, and the space between them is silent but filling up with their breaths. "Hi."

"Hi," Finn says. He taps Poe's knee, where the half biscuit is balanced. "Take your piece."

"I--" Poe wants to refuse. He thinks he _should_ refuse, but he doesn't know why. "Finn. It's okay."

"Please?" Finn doesn't ask for things, not any longer. Definitely not from Poe. 

"Yeah, okay, thanks." Poe stuffs the biscuit into his mouth and chews rapidly. It tastes amazing, despite its long journey of diversions and customs-inspections. Kes started baking in earnest when Shara got sick; Poe long thought that Kes started to keep Poe busy and distracted, but he kept it up. Bringing Macondian traditions to bear on Yavinian ingredients was, Kes liked to claim, one of his greatest challenges and source of his greatest pride.

"I ever tell you how he claims to like baking better than me?" Poe says when he's swallowed and wiped his mouth on his good shoulder. "'Tricky and unpredictable as a bake is, it's nothing next to one hyper little bastard who never shut up', blah blah."

"He may have said something similar, yes," Finn says. The sweetness in his tone is probably all for Kes.

Poe tips against Finn's side, sighing, and then can't seem to gather the strength and will to pull away. He stiffens, however, skin tensing in recognition of where he is, how close he's come, and worry about getting pushed away. "Yeah."

"Yeah," Finn says. He's hoarse, looking back out into the dark, but his arm tightens a little, then a little more, around Poe. They're close enough that when Finn exhales, Poe's hair stirs.

"Look at that," Poe says, "we're agreeing again."

Finn snorts gently, then realizes he's smiling. His reflection in the observation screen is partial and ghoulish -- curving stripe of smile, glittering tech of his new eye. "So we are."

He presses his face against the crown of Poe's skull. As he breathes in warm scalp, tickling hair, his other arm comes around to complete the embrace. Poe sighs and wriggles, holding his breath as his bad shoulder grinds and bad hip pops; soon enough, the pain has passed and he's pulled all the closer against Finn.

"Did you save any jerky?" Finn whispers.

"Maybe," Poe mumbles. "Want to negotiate?"

Finn's mouth is warm, lips soft as they press against Poe's temple. "Yeah," he says, "I'd like that."

The Narragonian shrieks with everything it has as it banks starboard into an emergency jump. Finn holds on, and Poe kisses the base of his throat, and time stretches out.

That's how it's been ever since they met: collision, exhilaration, then eruption. Always loud, ever more desperate, they keep crashing together, then shuddering apart, only to rush headlong and heedless back. Maybe this time will be different, maybe they're going to stick fast and hold tight and _stay_.

"I'd like that a lot," Finn adds, and his mouth finds Poe's as the void brightens.


End file.
